Crushing on shorties since 2004.

Menu

Etgar Keret, "A Bet"

The kids don’t understand politics and death and nobody’s explaining it very well.

(from The Paris Review, Summer, 2005)

This one’s a shorti, as we might say here in Philly. It’s a lot like that Eggers one I read recently, because it’s about dealing with the disconnect of televized events and trying to make sense of them. But it’s not only about that. You spend the first two-thirds of the story thinking this is about wide-eyed, mischievous, curious little kids. Turns out they’re twisted little monsters. So much for hope for the next generation. I believe that children are the future killers.I’m not seeking the shortest stories out, I’m arriving at them by accident. I picked this one because the author came recommended by a friend who, when she sets her mind to it, can recommend about 100 authors at a time. So I think she said Etgar Keret, but maybe not. I’d thought I’d heard Edgar Carrot at the time. He’s probably not a real person.

AndTwo New Orleans writers I have read for I Read A Short Story Today, Pia Z. Ehrhardt and Poppy Z. Brite — you may recall me pitting them against each other for no good reason — are writing interesting things about returning to the city they love after the hurricane. I think you’ll dig the way PZE tugs at your heart with poetic observations. I think you’ll also enjoy the way PZB is brutal and beautiful and a little bit psycho. Both blogs are intimate and earnest — a personal perspective you might be missing out on now that media has receded with the floodwaters.

“Across the street from our house, someone’s dumped a black refrigerator, bound it tight with silver duct tape. It’s going to be a long time before I take twice weekly garbage pickup for granted again.”—Pia Z. Ehrhardt. Here‘s the link.

“We slept in the old house on our first night, which was creepy: it’s definitely haunted, not by ghosts but by our old lives that will never exist again.”—Poppy Z. Brite. Here‘s the link.